Early Girl
by Libertine Past
Summary: Maybe it's a feeling that something has changed, or maybe it's a feeling that nothing has.


_1997_

The young Deschanel is told "_Mi casa es su casa,"_ except in English, and with much less sincerity. Still, he takes this seriously. _  
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Each day, even when no one is home, the Richards estate is his Discovery Zone. Today, he's been in the wine cellar, where he found a '55 blanc-de-blancs to suit his palate. He soaked himself in the Jacuzzi to the point of possible infertility. He tried to get into the attic and dodged the crashing descent of a guillotine-like pull-down ladder. The Frenchman cringed. For now, the revolution would change its course.

Olivia had a hot compress sort of day at the radio station, and she collapses on the sofa. Hanson was in the studio and the screech of teen girls is still jostling her brain._ A lot of good that does, swarming around someone unattainable and screaming, _she thinks. No, to get your idol to notice you, let alone marry you, you had to resort to much more desperate measures.

_Teenager or grown woman, we could all use a good dusting of self-control._

The television chatters in the background, _"Tonight on Must-See Tuesday, it's 'Frasier.' Roz is pregnant, but who is the father?"_

She clicks it off quickly and steps out of the French doors. She never spends much time on the grounds beyond the edge of the pool, but today, she ambles down the walkway and hears a man grunting.

She hones in on the sound, fearing the exertion of lovers.

She doesn't expect to find Cole alone, sweat-glossed, and wrangling a tomato cage in the garden.

"What the hell are you doing in there, looking for buried treasure?" Olivia asks. "Get _out_ before I spray you with the hose!"

He smirks, "Go ahead. These babies could use the water. I'll take one for the team." He has dirt in every bone cleft of his hands and his fingernails are black. He goes on with what at least appears to be work, beads of sweat trailing down his collarbone.

Olivia isn't convinced. "Alright, Cole, I think you're filthy enough to stroll indoors, flop down on the sofa and put your feet up on the tea table. That's what you're going for, isn't it? Pushing this 'come and go as you please' thing as ridiculously far as you can, just to amuse yourself?"

"Hang on." He squishes a hornworm at her eye level, the green pus flying in all directions as she lets out a chest-clutching _Oh!_ "Now_ that_ amuses me," he says. "Very cathartic, too."

"Are you out of your mind?"

"Now, Olivia, the question you _should_ be asking yourself is, 'why am I paying a gardener who doesn't know a damn thing about tomatoes?' This cage was cutting right through the stem," he gestures over the plant. "They're over-pruned, and don't even get me started on the blossom end rot. Is this garden just a charade of all-American normalcy, or are you going to saddle up and have the sweetest harvest on Ocean Avenue?"

Olivia stands there with her mouth agape. The term Gregory would surely use for him is "idiot savant," but Cole's passion on the subject intrigues her. "How do you know so much about tomatoes, in an almost…unsettling fashion?" Naturally, she says "tom-ah-to," but there's no use getting into _that_ argument.

"Well, in my bloodline, it's frowned upon to befriend the lowly servants. So, that's exactly what I did. Especially the ones who worked with dirt, and lots of it."

She half smiles, taken by a very private triumph over Madame Deschanel. "It's getting clearer now."

"Good. So fire your gardener," he says, crouching back down to the soil, "and be loud and enthusiastic about it."

"I'm not going to fire him. I know he weeds. I've seen him at it for hours."

"What really drains the life out of them is the suckers."

"What's that, another insect?" she asks, crouching beside him.

"No, it's these little leaves in the crotch joints of the branches, see?" he says closely. "You've gotta pinch those off. They're taking away all the sugar that brings the flavor."

"Well, pardon my ignorance, but it's not like Poison went around singing 'Every Tomato Has Its Sucker."

He laughs. "At least I would've had a good conversation piece during awkward eight grade slow dances."

"I'm sure, but let's not digress," she smiles. "I just might be warming up to the idea that Jean-Louis needs to find another job. Go on."

Olivia studies him as he continues. OK, so certain words that are innocuous in tomato talk are a guilty delight to her hormonal mind- not to mention the way he cups the fruit in his hand.

Of course, there's more to it than that.

She likes how animated he is when he talks about tomatoes, the way his voice is completely free of the tension that has plagued them for weeks. She feels the cool soil between her fingers. He tells stories about gardens in Naples that were pure glory to him, where the fruit grew in every color. She is truly moved by the way tomatoes were his first jewels, the ornaments on his bare orphan heart. She wants to remember how she felt about him in this greenery, instead of that pervasive shame…but there is quite a danger in that.

"You're very clever," she says, swallowing hard.

Cole isn't sure how Olivia went from reprimanding him to being beside him in the dirt, but the thought makes him feel like a tick smothering in oil. Maybe it's a feeling that something has changed, or maybe it's a feeling that nothing has. Her blazer happens to be hanging off one shoulder. The sun-kissed knoll is tantalizing to him, and self-reproach hits him hard and fast. "Thank you," he says shortly.

"I feel like I'm in Italy."

"The sun is brutal, you really should get inside."

"I never knew you had such a lovely hobby."

"It's really kind of creepy."

"Not at all. It's not like you fill up a tub with crushed tomatoes and…i-it's definitely not like that."

"…Olivia, I'm…" he says, pointing aimlessly somewhere, "Probably should. Go. Shower," he says, smearing dirt across his brow as he wipes his sweat away.

She doesn't want him to go, but she can't ask him not to go, so she hooks him with: "I had an appointment with the obstetrician yesterday."

He knows he hasn't eaten any wild mushrooms since he's been out here, but he also knows he heard her right. "Oh, yeah?"

"The baby looks beautiful." She feels its small, liquid movement as if on cue. Cole nods at her sudden smile, wondering what it would be like if his heart had to ration its beats with another person. She takes one of the dangling fruits in the palm of her hand. "It's about this size now."

His eyes flash. "Whoa, no, early girls aren't very strong, and that one has spots." He starts sifting through the plants. "You should go with more of a hybrid-"

"Cole, Cole," she hushes him, as her throat narrows with understanding. "I just meant the size, it's not some sort of voodoo effigy of the baby."

He looks away. He doesn't want to go back to the days of her storming off when he mentions the child, but he's just left a very raw part of himself exposed. Maybe he _does_ want her to run away screaming, the way she should have a while ago. "Sorry…I'm a little superstitious."

"Well, farmers usually are."

"Yeah, as if," he snickers, looking down. "To have a simple life like that, God, I…" He puffs a sigh that tops off his dimples. "It's obviously too late now."

"Why? Nothing in the past can change the fact that this bloody well suits you. You're drawn to the magic of it, and that's all that matters. Make things appear. Be happy, Cole."

Her words make his body freeze and go hot. He ransacks his short lifetime of memories and knows in .5 seconds that she is the first person to say these words to him.

_Be happy._

People don't say this to a man living the life of Riley, even though nobody seems to know who Riley actually is. If tomatoes are the best fruit to throw at horrible performances, he has been pelted, inside and out. She tips her chin up slightly, slipping under the sheen on his hickory eyes.

He can't separate his body from an acknowledgment of her grace. He doesn't know how to respond other than to touch her, and he feels so primitive for it. Surely, he can think of something to say, _something_. His sullied hands frame her face. "…I am," he says, scarcely louder than the bees.

Since this is a garden, the woman decides to take full responsibility for their downfall.

She pounces on his lips and knocks him into the dirt and tangled nightshade, meeting his parched tongue with hers. He runs his gritty hands down the small of her back, carefully cultivating her pleasure as her hands ball into fists on his chest. Voracious, he can't contain enough breath for her four-syllable name. She crushes harder into his hips. He imagines being lovers amid the riotous Tomatina fight in Spain, rolling and gliding through a sea of ruby pulp.

He whisks her into his arms and staggers for the house, his pulse pounding deep into Olivia's skin.

When he carries her through the French doors, only locking eyes with her as he does this, Caitlin emerges from the dining room. "Oh my God," she gasps as her eyes absorb them. "Mom, what happened? Did you fall? Are you hurt?"

The misunderstanding clicks immediately, and an Oscar-worthy moment unfolds. "Oh, darling, I think I twisted my ankle in the garden," Olivia says, trembling. There is no blood flow above her waist. His arousal is hidden by the chance positioning of her skirt. "Cole was so gallant, he rushed to my aid."

"See, Mom?" Cait sighs, a wistful relief in her voice. "I knew you would come around if you dared to look at him through my eyes. Garçon?" she smirks at Cole, "Usher this woman to bed, please."

Olivia in his arms, they make the excruciating journey up the staircase. She blinks against his chest, but it feels nothing like butterflies. Just a thousand stings.

He places her gently on her bed to rest her "ankle." He feels like he's going to die. He exhales on her hard, like she's a plant who will flourish from it, and then he's gone.

She can see a smear of dirt on her face in the dresser mirror. The words "Don't go…" finally find enough air to form. She hates herself for being upset. They've escaped certain disaster, and it's crazy to cry over spilled adultery, but unquenched desire has never felt like this.

A scream can be so loud in your head, so loud it seems impossible that no one else can hear it. Olivia feels the sound become a blight that spreads inward, into the past, the present and the nursery.

**_The End_**


End file.
